Opportunities (Missed and Achieved)

Quite a nice outing today. Although they were a couple of missed moments - mostly caused by crows! Darn them crows.

Cloudless and blue sky. Can't ask for anything better as we approach the weekend.

Spotted the Muskrat again. Look at its blade-like tail! Strong and powerful for an aquatic rodent.

The only photograph I got of a Pied-billed Grebe (Podilymbus podiceps) as it dived away afterwards. I can't believe how sharply-focused this image is despite the distance away. Lucky me!

Only when I put this photo on the computer did I realized that there was a Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) in the nest box. Lovely.

I finally successful photographed my first (two) butterflies of the year. They were Cabbage White Butterflies (Pieris rapae). One was a male, and this is the female - as identified by the two spots on her wings (males have one spot).

The flowers in the community garden are coming along nicely. Look at these bright red flowers!

This looks like an oil painting with the way the light bouncing off the glossy red petals. Beautiful!

I also spotted these two Scaups (left - female; right - male). I think they are Greater Scaups (Aythya marila) with the rounder head. But I could be wrong.

Coming back, I (think I) saw a Peregrine Falcon hovering above the Terra Nova Natureal Area. But it was being hounded by a crow, so they flew back and forth over the field - not enabling me to get a good look at the bird. But there was a couple of times when the falcon would "hover" in the air looking down.

Then it was time to head home. The birds on Sturgeon Bank at this time of the year are: Tree Swallows, Eurpean Starlings, Red-winged Blackbirds, Mallards, Wrens (pictured below), and Sparrows. As you can tell, I am not too confident with the identification of the little brown birds that I saw on the marsh.

Is this a Marsh Wren (Cistothorus palustris) or a Bewick's Wren (Thryomanes bewickii)? I think a Marsh Wren, no?

At the steps near Francis Road, on the telephone was this immature Bald Eagle - looking quite mysterious with the dark band over its eyes. Having a bird of such power doesn't sit well with the crows in the area, and it was chased off by three crows immediately. Darn them crows!
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